Two Sicilies

The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies was a union of the Kingdom of Naples and Sicily that existed from 1808 to 1861. The union was created by the Edict of Bayonne in 1808, and Joachim Murat ruled the Two Sicilies as an ally of the First French Empire from 1808 to 1815. After the Battle of Tolentino in 1815, Ferdinand IV of Naples became King of the Two Sicilies, and the House of Bourbon replaced Murat's line as the rulers of the country. The Two Sicilies had two capitals, Palermo and Naples, and the kingdom was heavily agricultural, with many of its inhabitants living in abject poverty after the Two Sicilies was incorporated into Italy in 1861. The Two Sicilies came to an end when Giuseppe Garibaldi and his nationalist Redshirts conquered the region in 1861, uniting it with Sardinia-Piedmont to create a united Italian kingdom.